My daughter is 3.5 weeks and has been bathed in a baby tub three times so far (she had a couple of sponge baths in the first week). Probably we should increase the frequency to three baths a week, but she isn't smelly, and we clean her diaper area carefully at every change.

We did the at-home sponge bath on her changing pad. We laid out one of those disposable absorbent mats from the hospital and washed and rinsed her body with washcloths. We took her into the bathroom to wash and rinse her hair.

sponge bath until the doctor cut off and cauterized the belly button thing (it didn't fall off on it's own). After that, every time he spits up....which is usually once per day...or he poops, which is about once every 2-3 days.

Daily is excessive and not good for the baby. I think we did once every 7-10 days. Baby never smelled. We would gently wipe her crevices daily with a wet washcloth.

We waited about two weeks for the cord stump to fall off with both kids (and did sponge baths before then). With kid #1, then gave full baths once a week (largely because he hated them, so they weren't part of a relaxing bedtime routine as they are for some). Kid #2 spits up a lot more, so we do them 2-3x a week so he won't smell like spoiled milk. Every day is not super healthy for baby skin, as others have said, but I do know people who did short baths every night because their babies couldn't fall asleep otherwise.

For sponge baths, we just wet a washcloth and held the baby while wiping him down--not much water involved so no need for sink basin or bathtub.

Anonymous wrote:To those of you doing the sponge baths -- do you do it in the baby bathtub inside the regular bathtub, and just wipe them down with a sponge/wash cloth? Are you holding them over the sink with running water? I'm starting to wonder if I should take one of those newborn care classes after all, yikes.

We only ended up doing one or two sponge baths because his stump fell off pretty fast (probably because we accidentally gave it a little help falling off by putting a too-big cloth diaper on him when he was like 5 days old - PSA: don't be stupid like us). Anyway, since we only did a couple I don't know if this is the most efficient system, but we laid out a couple (adult size) towels on the kitchen counter next to the sink and laid him down on those while we did the sponge bath with two washcloths (one soapy, one just wet for rinsing). If you have a grandmother around to help in the first week, you will get good advice and earn brownie points if you ask her to show you how to do the bath; it ended up my MIL was frigging thrilled when we asked her for help on that. Otherwise there are probably a thousand youtube videos on it, so don't worry about taking a class. I watched a youtube video before we did the first tub bath because I was nervous.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:1-2x week. Her ass is cleaned daily.

Her ass???

That's the thing her shit comes out of.

First baby - no full immersion in water until stump fell off...sponge bath which basically meant a naked baby, a towel to lay the baby on, and a wet washcloth with a small bowl of warm water. Then daily baths.

Second baby - same as above for first bath and then 1-2x a week at most. Butt kept clean at all times, obviously. I don't know if it's related, but my second had significantly better skin than my first - less rashes, baby acne, cradle cap, etc.

A friend who had a 4th joked that she maybe hosed the baby off a few times in the first 6 months. It's all fine. Before they start eating solids, they're not getting dirty anyway. They do not need daily baths or even close to it.

I don't think we really did baths until 6-8 weeks! Sponge baths until then. Infants don't really need baths.

To those of you doing the sponge baths -- do you do it in the baby bathtub inside the regular bathtub, and just wipe them down with a sponge/wash cloth? Are you holding them over the sink with running water? I'm starting to wonder if I should take one of those newborn care classes after all, yikes.

sponge bath once/week or so until cord stump fell off - then full bath 1x/week until she got more active, when we upped it to 2x/week. even at 2 years, it's not daily (well, not usually, depends on how often she gets filthy.)

Sponge baths until the cord stump fell off.

Well, I guess I win the award for grossest baby. Just gave DS first real bath at 4 weeks old. Prior to this we did sponge baths every other day. It took a long time for the stump to fall off and we had some bleeding so I wanted to make sure that area was well and healed before putting him in water.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I did sponge baths until the cord stump fell off. About 3 a week.

I didn't do a "real" bath until about 2 weeks because it took that long for the stump to fall off.

This is what you are supposed to do. No baths until cord falls off per my ped. It's not like the baby's dirty.

Yes just sponge bath

Anonymous wrote:I did sponge baths until the cord stump fell off. About 3 a week.

I didn't do a "real" bath until about 2 weeks because it took that long for the stump to fall off.

This is what you are supposed to do. No baths until cord falls off per my ped. It's not like the baby's dirty.

Anonymous wrote:Ew gross OP. Your baby poops on himself...he needs a bath every day.

Not if you wash your baby's bottom after every poop which is what I do. OP ask your obgyn how many times you should be giving her a bath and when. Waiting two weeks is a bit too much in my opinion but every baby is different